Please submit only technical tips that will help other TidBITS readers better use their Macs, iPhones, iPads, and related software and hardware. All product announcements should be sent to releases@tidbits.com.

Tip title*

Your tip*

URL

Enter the URL to a Web page that supports your tip.

Linked text

Enter the name of the page linked above.

Your name*

Your email*

* indicates required fields

To help us avoid automated posts and spam, please enter the words below.

When you submit a tip, you give us permission to use it. Read our terms for more details. All submissions are reviewed before publication.

Our terms: By submitting a tip, you agree to assign TidBITS Publishing Inc., a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual license to reproduce, publish, and distribute your tip in connection with the TidBITS Web site and associated products in any media. You agree that you created the content you submitted, and that you have the right to assign us this license. You give us permission to use your name, but your email address won't be publicly displayed or shared. We review all submissions before publication, and reserve the right to select which submissions we feel are appropriate for our readers and to edit those we publish.

Our terms: We reserve the right to edit or delete any comment, so please post thoughtfully. We use your email address only to send you a one-time verification message confirming that you posted this comment. We also store your address to allow you to verify using other Web browsers in the future. For more info, see our privacy policy.

Easily Change Firewall Settings in VirusBarrier X6

If you need different levels of protection on your laptop based on location, you can set up VirusBarrier X6's two-way firewall with multiple configurations. Whenever you change locations, switch easily to the firewall settings you want to use from the Intego menu, located in the menu bar. Make as many configurations as you want: for home, office, when you're on public Wi-Fi, and so on.

TidBITS Watchlist: Notable Software Updates for 4 March 2013

Scrivener 2.4 -- Literature & Latte has released Scrivener 2.4 with an abundance of refinements and fixes for the word processor that’s focused on long-form writing projects. (To learn how to use Scrivener to write scripts, novels, academic works, and more, check out Kirk McElhearn’s “Take Control of Scrivener 2.”) The update adds support for Retina displays, separate global and project-based compile presets, an option to include a standard Adobe Digital Editions page template when compiling (this can be unchecked to avoid errors
with its inclusion in files destined for iTunes Producer), an option to start Kindle books after the front matter (or at the very first page if left unchecked), support for the Fountain screenplay syntax, support for dragging Scapple notes into Scrivener’s freeform corkboard mode, and larger text fields for the Find and Project Replace panels that also display invisible characters. The list of fixed bugs include a critical data-loss issue where edits made in scrivenings mode could fail to save if the project had been open for more than two days, a crash that occurred after creating a new project and immediately applying a layout, and a problem with the sandboxed Mac App Store version where projects couldn’t be saved as templates.

Scrivener 2.4 is available in two versions from the Literature & Latte Web site’s downloads page — one for Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and later (also available from the Mac App Store) and one for 10.5 Leopard and 10.4 Tiger. As of this writing, Scrivener is still stuck at version 2.3.1 at the Mac App Store. However, you can download the demo from the Literature & Latte site and replace the Mac App Store version on your system, where the demo will run as though it were registered normally. ($45 new from Literature & Latte and the Mac App Store, free update, 35.7 MB (31.4 MB for the
10.4/10.5 version), release notes)

CrashPlan 3.5.2 -- Code 42 Software has released CrashPlan 3.5.2, a small maintenance release for the popular Internet backup software that does make one major change — dropping support for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. (To learn more about CrashPlan, check out Joe Kissell’s “Take Control of CrashPlan Backups.”) A CrashPlan support page notes that current backups and restores will continue uninterrupted, but it does recommend upgrading to a later edition of Mac OS X in order to take
advantage of features in future versions. CrashPlan 3.5.2 adds support for Retina displays, support for Java 7, and localizations for Japanese, Portuguese, Chinese (Simplified) and Chinese (Traditional). It also fixes an issue with Web restore that affected some users, improves cross-platform computer adoptions, and ensures the menu bar no longer disappears after the system wakes from sleep. There’s no need to download CrashPlan 3.5.2 manually, as the app will automatically upgrade on its own on Macs running 10.5 Leopard and later (though it might take a few days). (Free with a 30-day trial of the CrashPlan+ online backup service, 21.2 MB, release notes)

DEVONthink and DEVONnote 2.5 -- Adding a significant synchronization boost to its stable of information management apps, DEVONtechnologies has updated all three editions of DEVONthink (Pro Office, Pro, and Personal) plus DEVONnote to version 2.5. The new release enables you to synchronize databases between multiple computers and locations using Dropbox, a WebDAV server, or your own mountable drive, as well as with other copies of DEVONthink on the same local network or VPN. Colleagues can access the same “sync store,” download
databases, work offline, and then synchronize all changes (local and remote) either manually or automatically. (For more details, see Joe Kissell’s “Take Control of Getting Started with DEVONthink 2, Second Edition.”)

All three editions of DEVONthink plus DEVONnote have also received improved tagging capabilities, including a Tags column in document lists to make it easier to tag multiple items. DEVONthink Pro Office improves its Web sharing capabilities, providing support for uploading, creating, renaming, moving, and trashing documents, and editing text plus adding the capability to convert images and scanned PDFs to searchable PDFs. In addition to Mac-based Web browsers, the full Web interface also runs on Safari on the iPad.

If you have been using any of the previously available public betas of DEVONthink 2.5, you’ll need to delete your existing sync store folder (on your file server, WebDAV drive, or on Dropbox) before using the final version. (All updates are free. DEVONthink Pro Office, $149.95 new, release notes; DEVONthink Professional, $79.95 new, release notes; DEVONthink Personal, $49.95 new, release notes; DEVONnote, $24.95 new, release notes; 25-percent discount for TidBITS members on DEVONnote and all editions of DEVONthink)

PDFpen and PDFpenPro 5.9.5 -- Smile has updated PDFpen and PDFpenPro to version 5.9.5, a small maintenance release for the PDF-manipulation programs that should provide relief from a few glitches. The release improves its handling of the current zoom level when entering Full Screen mode, avoids a potential crash during internal notification, fixes a rare problem of following page links, and fixes sidebar initialization on window restoration at launch. For full documentation, see Michael Cohen’s “Take
Control of PDFpen 5.” ($59.95/$99.95 new with a 20-percent discount for TidBITS members, free update, 47.5/48.5 MB)

Make friends and influence people by sponsoring TidBITS!Put your company and products in front of tens of thousands ofsavvy, committed Apple users who actually buy stuff.More information: <http://tidbits.com/advertising.html>